This is Goodnight and not Goodbye

Post by Net

So as our project draws to a close, we found ourselves at a story telling evening amongst our Latvian Scout and Guide friends. Although originally planned to be held around a campfire, they wisely decided to move it inside when the temperatures dropped to below zero! So instead, we all gathered together in the school assembly hall, by the light of candles at the front. Old friends sat amongst new friends, and 5 of the experienced Leaders, Rangers and Rovers stood up to tell one of their (many) Guiding or Scouting stories.

We were huddled at the back of the room, the 5 of us lying on the floor, shoulders touching, heads into the centre of our little semi circle, with Liga (or Martins when Liga was talking) lying in front of us, translating to us in whispers.

We heard stories of going on hikes with not enough food, and scouts sharing and staying enthusiastic despite this. We heard stories of travelling to Japan and experiencing new cultures. We heard stories of being bullied at school because of being in scouts. The storytellers answered questions: 'Have you ever regretted being in this organisation?' 'What's the most extreme thing you've done in Scouting?' 'Whats the most important bit of being a Scout?'

As I lay there in the quiet glow of the candlelight, listening first to the Latvian, and then to the English translation, I realised that I had heard all these stories before, and yet I hadn't. I realised that these stories are stories of scouts and guides everywhere, and yet they are still unique to the individual.

I thought back to our training from Thursday night where we discussed the WAGGGS 5 essentials, including 'sharing a commitment to a common standard' and I saw it in action. Everyone in this room has made the same promise and lives by the same basic laws, and here we were, listening to stories of how it had affected people's lives.

And not for the first time, and not for the last, I was reminded of the worldwide family I am lucky enough to be a part of. I thought of the friends I have around the world from past adventures. I thought of the Latvian Scouts and Guides that I have been lucky enough to work with over the last two years.

But mostly I thought about my GOLD sisters, lying around me, connected by more than just our shoulders. We've worked hard (and played hard) over the last three weeks, we've run activities for almost 200 members - and that doesn't include this camp. We've run trainings, meetings and activities based on teamwork, leadership, communication and international experiences. We've planned, changed plans, and then done things that completely weren't on the plan in the first place. We've laughed, we've cried, we've played games, we've done puzzles, we've eaten far too much food, but whatever we were doing, we did it together, and I'm proud of all of us.

This is good night and not goodbye.

Cake, Culture and Glow Sticks...

Post by Net and Sarah K 

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, we were lucky enough to have three free days, before our final weekend of project. We took the opportunity to be tourists, to soak up the culture, and generally explore Latvia more! 

Monday found us at the Occupation Museum in Riga, learning more about the last hundred years in Latvia, and the turbulent past that the country has been through. After an hour or so wandering through, reading and learning how little we actually know about the wars (Who knew the Berlin wall went ALL the way around West Berlin?! Maybe we should have paid more attention in History lessons!), we headed back into the cold of Riga, and straight to a cafe (of course!). This was followed by a wander around the Russian Orthodox church, with it's ornate images and decorations, and a second trip to the Radisson hotel skyline bar - for the sunset views, honestly! The evening was a little bizarre to say the least - we ended up playing Uno and Bananagrams by the light of glow sticks. GOLD is a strange world to live in. 

Monday also brought the news that Sarah K's sister-in-law had gone into labour, but by the time we went to bed, there was STILL NO BABY! Sarah and Net went to sleep with the phone on loud in between their pillows so that when the phone did eventually ring (2am!!), we were both woken up with exciting news - Lauren Elizabeth had arrived :D (We're all a little confused when Lauren's birthday actually is now, as she was born on 26th UK time, but 27th Latvia time!!) Laura also popped her head in to celebrate at 2am - turns out none of Team Latvia had much sleep on Monday night. 

Tuesday, we headed out to the Ethnographic museum of Latvia - lots of old buildings in a rather large forest. We had a great time wandering around the buildings, and running up and down hills, as well as playing some frisbee, and making a congratulations video for Alice - the team leader from Latvia 2014 who got married on Tuesday! We headed back to Riga, making a detour via a memorial for the victims of the Latvian holocaust that we had learnt about the day before. 

Just as you thought Team Latvia couldn't get more bizarre than glow in the dark Uno, we ended up having a glow in the dark Baby shower for Lauren - we had light up balloons, glow sticks and bubbles, and ended up dancing the evening away with YMCA, Macarena and the Cha Cha Slide all looking particularly good in glow form! 

Today has been very relaxing, starting with Sarah cooking scotch pancakes for breakfast, and Net cooking a fry up for brunch. In the afternoon, the team split, with Sarah S and Laura heading for some spa time relaxation, and Net, Katie and Sarah K heading for the shops! 

Tomorrow, we are back to project with our Ranger/Rover evening, and also packing for camp on Friday :) 

We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo!

Post by Laura

Unfortunately, our leaders' training day on Saturday had to be cancelled...so instead....we went to the zoo.  We got on the tram slightly unsure of where to get off, but quickly realised there were several families with young children that would clearly lead the way.

On arrival, the first animals we encountered were goats and sheep labelled as chickens - it was going to be a good day.  Other highlights included: a ridiculous amount of time looking at and filming the giraffes, Net filming a climbing tortoise for over 2 minutes, the huge crocodile in the reptile house as well as our favourite little lizard, the gecko and the sting rays in the aquarium.

After the 16 hectares we covered at the zoo and to celebrate our project so far, we headed out to a traditional Latvian restaurant and folk club for dinner.  The food and atmosphere was soaked up and enjoyed by all.  We even managed to cheer up our waiter who was clearly rushed off his feet.

An early-ish start on Sunday found us at the train station where we met some Scouts in time for the 9.50 train to Jurmala to go sailing with the Sea Scouts we had seen twice in the last two weeks.  After a 4 km walk from the station, we arrived at the Sea Scout jetty and were greeted by the leader Valdis. The Scouts got out some little sailing boats, a larger sailing boat and several canoes and kayaks.  

Then before activities on the water began, we had a small parade and flag ceremony involving raising the Latvian Scout and Guide Sailing Team flag next to the Latvian flag and the Union Jack which we had brought with us.  We then led some games with the group to warm up a little before taking to the water.  The Scouts paired themselves off and took a member of Team Latvia with them out on the canoes while the remaining scouts were taken out on the sailing boats.

When the Scouts had returned Team Latvia to dry ground, Katie decided she'd had enough of canoeing for the day but the rest of Team Latvia went back out on the Kayaks on their own.  Meanwhile, on shore a fire was started where the Scouts sat around to keep warm, eat their lunch, cook sausages and toast marshmallows.  Some were also still being shown the ropes on the sailing boats.  

After the rest of Team Latvia had returned to shore and eaten their own lunch and warmed up by the fire, Valdis and Agija offered to take us out on the larger sailing boat for a go.  So we all jumped in the boat and Sarah S, Sarah K and myself took it in turns to be the captain in charge, accompanied by our inflatable parrot prop we had also brought for sailing, named Carruthers earlier in the day when out on the kayaks.  Sarah S and myself had never been sailing before and really enjoyed it.  Sarah K had done it before and got us stuck on a sand bank.

On return to shore, it was time to pack up and there was another parade and lowering of flags ceremony to finish the day.  We said our goodbyes and decided to give Carruthers to Agija as her new mascot when representing Latvia and set off on the long walk back to the station.

    

The GOLDen Autumn

Post written by Net and Sarah K 

After the craziness of the day trip to Valmiera, we were lucky enough to have 2 days off to recover before the next week of training and meetings. We had met up with Laura's friend Karlis a few days before and he had suggested taking us to Sigulda - a town next to Gauja National Park, which is very picturesque. Karlis recruited one of his friends, and we jumped into their two cars and off we went! I slept for the entire journey, but I'm sure it was beautiful on the way... 

We arrived at Sigulda and our first stop was Turaida castle (although we got distracted by a church and a couple of other things on the way.) At the castle, we climbed the rather large tower, up some very narrow staircases - not great with rucksacks and a large amount of tourists! We spent a considerable amount of time discussing how we would convert it into our house - there's going to be a balcony all the way around, and a campfire room! After a difficult route down, we continued to investigate the rest of the castle, and found some buttons to play with. 

Next we had a walk around the sculpture park, and other exhibits, and found a big pile of leaves to jump in (yay for GOLDen autumns :) ) and then headed to find some lunch - proper Latvian food - meat and potatoes! We were then taken to the bobsleigh track which unfortunately was being used for actual bobsleighing, so we couldn't have a go (we're not sure if our insurance would have covered it anyway!) but it was fun to have a look around. After this, we headed back home, and I slept again - it was dark this time, so I don't think I missed as much! 

Back in the apartment, and we decided it was time for some pampering - facemasks, nail varnish and smores were all in order :D A few more of the bubbles that I bought the team were blown as well - not just any bubbles though, these ones don't pop! (it's Tuesday now, and there are still some stuck to the wall...) 

Monday found us in our favourite teahouse, curled up on the floor cushions - we were actually there to plan! We spent just under 3 hours there, planning for the rest of the week, particularly for the Training Day we have on Saturday. It was very productive, and the proximity to cheesecake definitely helped! 

In the evening, we were lucky enough to have an evening with Liga, and she took us out kayaking!! We headed off down the River Daugava, and then along the canal, and back out to the river. We didn't quite manage to see a beaver, but there were loads of ducks, and the bridges were lit up along the canal and were awesome to float underneath. Thanks Liga! 

Afterwards, we were all pretty exhausted, so it was time for bed. 

Today we're off to Jurmala again, and we're teaching them how to make woggles, so we've spent the morning teaching OURSELVES how to make woggles! We'll let you know how it goes in the next blog post.

Did everyone remember their spare pigeon..?! Third briefing weekend 24-26th July

Blog post by Sarah K

Third briefing began on a VERY wet Friday at the end of July. We all travelled up (or across) to PGL Caythorpe, which for most of us took much longer than planned due to rain, traffic etc – generally your typical English summer day!  Sarah S was being dropped off in Grantham a little later in the evening than the rest of us, so we went on a road trip in Katie’s car to pick her up!  Katie doesn’t have the biggest car and had never driven it with so many people in it, so squashing us all in was quite amusing – I’m not sure she’ll volunteer to drive next time!  We turned up in ASDA car park in typical Team Latvia style…with a picture of a pigeon attached to a pole to help Sarah find us (for those of you not in on the joke, Anna (GOLD co-ordinator) suggested to the leaders that they could communicate via carrier pigeon….we took this very literally and managed to send her one at the World Scout Jamboree!!).

Anna with the 'pigeon' we sent her at the World Scout Jamboree in Japan!

Once back at PGL, we set about our first very important task for the weekend – celebrating Net’s birthday! We got her a variety of silly presents, including a bubble gun/fan (very handy for Latvia!) and of course ate some cake (made by Sarah K).  This was a bit of a late night with everyone so full of sugar so we sat up chatting and catching up ready to get to work in the morning.

Presents, cakes & pigeons

Saturday started on a slightly sad note.  Unfortunately Ellen has decided that she is unable to continue with the project and come to Latvia, due to personal commitments.  We are going to miss her very much, but wish her all the best!!  That leaves us as a team of five moving forwards, and so we set about discussing the rest of the project and how to work as a five.

Net had created a list of 18 things we needed to discuss over the weekend – not much really!! We began by doing the easy bit….writing the kit list.  An hour later we had filled a massive white board with all sorts of things we need to remember.  We were excited to receive an email from the Chief Guide in Latvia telling us more about the project, and began to discuss what we need to plan.  A lot of our work is going to be with the Rangers and Rovers so we looked at what resources were available in the UK already and made a list of things we need to collect.  We are also going to be doing a whole international based training day….more info on this will come from 4^th briefing!  We also discussed ways of reviewing things on project, including having a worry box and a memory box, and debated what gifts to get our hosts.

Creating the kit list

Laura's excited!!

After lunch we decided it was time for some team building so Net took us up on the high ropes course.  Sarah, Sarah and Katie took a bit of convincing to do it, but Laura thought it was great.  Needless to say we all made it round – Laura and Sarah K even had another go!  After we had all recovered from the adrenaline rush we got back to doing more planning and had almost finished our to do list by the end of the day.  After dinner we headed down the road to the local pub for a drink, where we sat at a table next to a parrot not in a cage (much to Sarah K’s horror!), and Laura tried to teach us a new version of I-spy.  This took us a loooooonnnngggg time to figure out, and I for one am still slightly confused, hopefully I’ll understand by the end of project!  We spent most of the evening relaxing, eating more cake and getting very competitive over Uno and Dobble.

We survived!!

Sunday was Katie’s birthday! We had more presents, more cake, and more planning time!  We discussed how we all deal with different emotions (a hug seems appropriate in most situations!) as well as discussed when our next teleconference will be.  We finished off the morning by taking a few pictures before having lunch and played a few more games of Dobble and ninjas before loading into cars and going our separate ways ready for 4^th briefing in just less than 6 weeks time!

Katie's birthday cake

GOLD love

Sarah K and Team Latvia xx

2nd Briefing Weekend

Blog post by Katie

The Charade Ghost

2 months after our 1^st Briefing, with chatting and planning in between, team Latvia reunited at Scout

Park in London. The first evening involved catching up with everyone, a side excursion to buy a tin opener and 100 bread rolls, and Guiding charades with a twist, where a member of each team had to communicate the word whilst inside a bed sheet!

Saturday was jam packed with team activities and training sessions. We started with our team activities which had to tell the other teams something about our country or our project aims, and we had to plan it without our leader’s involvement. Team Latvia came up with a code breakers game set in the Latvia forest. Each team had to decode a message in Morse code to find out which tree had their flag puzzle (each Latvian team member was a tree; for example I was a Maple tree and Net was a ‘Qualti’tree, so had Quality Street sweets stuck on her). It was then a race to see who could put their flag back together correctly first. We picked this activity because during the occupation of the Soviet Union when Guiding and Scouting was banned, groups met in secret in the woods. A few of the other teams’ activities included a Guinea Pig festival from Team Peru and Dragons Den from Team Malawi where we had to pitch one of the 5 Essentials of Guiding.

The Trees of Latvia (Qualitree, Palm, Maple, Redwood, Beech & Oak)

We learnt about facilitating sessions and how to deal with different types of participants in the afternoon, and then we split up to have a training session about our specific team role. This year, the roles in the GOLD team have changed slightly. My role, the Photo & Video Coordinator, is new. You can read a bit more about our roles in an upcoming blog post.

Team Rwanda's creation is judged by 'Paul' and 'Mary'

Challenged to write the promise using dry spaghetti 

Our evening entertainment was TV-themed activities, which led to much fun and a lot of great costumes. I and Sarah are quite keen bakers, so we selected the Great British Bake Off. Each team had to make an object which represented their country out of marshmallow rice krispie mix and icing. Other teams ran games such as relay races, and the Poddington Peas put in an appearance as well.

Sunday brought on more training; we first had a choice between Translation training and Recruitment & Retention training. Most Latvians can speak excellent English, and for the youngest kids who might still be learning English, the adult leaders can help them out, so we as a team went to Recruitment & Retention. 

Playing 'Guess the WAGGGS resource'

Our final activity was a session about the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS). For many of the teams, one of the main aims is to promote international Guiding, so this activity was really useful in teaching us more about WAGGGS and learning about the resources, such as activity packs & board games that we can take with us.

And with that, all that was left was the traditional camp lunch of leftovers (I can report that naan bread and peach yoghurt go very well together) before saying our goodbyes and walking to the station. This was the very last time that all the GOLDies of 2015 would be together, as we all have our future briefing weekends separately, then the summer teams have a debrief together, and the winter teams (plus Malawi) have their debrief together. On a happier note, team Latvia has two more briefing weekends to look forward to, as we don’t go on project until October! 

Team Latvia at the 2nd Briefing Weekend

Meet Team Latvia

Blog post by Ellen

Net - Team Leader

Age: 25

Job: activity instructor / professional child annoyer

Favourite food: anything with chicken in it!

Travel: yes please!! I've been to America, Australia, Spain and France. With Girlguiding I have visited India (twice!!0, Finland and Latvia.

What are you looking forward to most in Latvia...? meeting friends from last year and continuing the hard work we did with a new team.

Sarah K- Treasurer

Age: 28

Job: Physiologist

Favourite food: Chicken nuggets

Travel:  Within Guiding I've visited Our Chalet twice and been to a few international camps in the UK too. I also had the opportunity to travel during my gap year. Whilst volunteering in a community in Kenya, I learnt to scuba dive. I also visited Tanzania, where I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. I have also traveled to the United States and Thailand.

What are you looking forward to most in Latvia...? I am most looking forward to working with the Guides and Scouts and seeing how everything works in a different country. Also camping in the forest will be a definite highlight!

Sarah S- First-aid

Age: 25

Job: Patent Secretary

Favourite food: Cheese

Travel: Australia (twice), Hong Kong, Fiji, Kenya, Belgium France, Spain, Hawaii, America- but this will be my first international trip with Girlguiding

What are you looking forward to most in Latvia...? making new friends, exploring the Baltic and camping in a forest!!

Laura- Resources Coordinator

Age: 28

Job: Engineering Geologist

Favourite food: Lasagne

Travel: I've been to France, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Italy, Israel, Oman, Jordan, Japan, Iceland, UAE and Australia. With Girlguiding I have attended and international camp in Norway which probably inspired many of the other trips as well as geology of course.

What are you looking forward to most in Latvia...? making new friends and embracing the challenges that no doubt will occur, not to mention camping in the forest in autumn!!! :)

Ellen- Secretary and Social Media

Age: 21

Job: Doctoral student at the University of Nottingham

Favourite food: Mac n' cheese

Travel: I was lucky enough to be selected for LaSER volunteering trip to Costa Rica  in 2011. I have also had the opportunity to visit the United States, the Caribbean as well as lots of European countries.

What are you looking forward to most in Latvia...? Camping and wearing lots of layers!!

Katie- Photo and Video Coordinator

Age: 24 

Job: Project Assistant for a heritage project

Favourite food: Hot chocolate fudge cake with ice-cream

Travel: Outside of Girlguiding I've visited America, France, Spain and Monaco. With Girlguiding I've visited Iceland, Denmark, Czech Republic, Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Finland and Canada.

What are you looking forward to most in Latvia...? Discovering the Latvian culture, and meeting and working with the Latvian Guides and Scouts.

INTOPS - International Opportunities Selection Weekend 26th-28th September 2014

Blog post by Laura 

Basically, don't get too comfortable and expect the unexpected. Not too much can be disclosed about what happened on this weekend but the first challenge that faced the majority was finding your new tent buddies and pitching a tent in the dark. The rest of the weekend followed in this manner with the situation constantly changing to assess how you might cope on a trip where you don't know the language and things change suddenly meaning you have to work together to come up with a new solution, activity to do etc. 

Sarah chatting with another INTOPS participant.

It was very challenging and tiring but you got to meet almost everyone at the weekend and at the end there was a real feeling of comradeship that we'd all survived. Several International Opportunities within Guiding were explained to us including volunteering at a World Centre, next years Roverway Camp in France and of course GOLD with everyone encouraged to apply. 

The Latvia team members all met at INTOPS except for our leader Net who was already Latvia bound once again. So we were hand picked with her in mind!! Sarah K and I (Laura) were actually tent buddies too. Katie attended as she really wanted to do GOLD and Latvia was actually her first choice. Sarah K also really wanted to do GOLD and like me had to do it this year before sadly becoming too old, it was now or never. Sarah S attended INTOPS for use as the residential experience for her Queen's Guide Award and while she was there she thought, why not apply for GOLD. 

Katie, Ellen, Laura & Sarah completing a challenge.

I for one thoroughly enjoyed the INTOPS weekend, especially meeting like minded and inspiring young woman from across the country, many of whom I've been lucky enough to get know a bit better through GOLD. So far the GOLD journey has been amazing and it just keeps getting better.